r&d

Battelle Memorial Institute and the National Science Foundation report indicates total research and development investment in the United States was strong in 2000, and is expected to increase about five percent in 2001. Battelle predicts that industry will continue to emphasize various forms of partnering and collaborations, including relationships with other industry, federal laboratories and international facilities.

The study by Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research uses the pharmaceutical industry as a case study, and suggests that the economic return on publicly funded basic research is substantial but on a time dimension that may be greater than most state and local leaders are anticipating.

The statistical report from the National Science Foundation reflect research and development funding levels as reported by 32 Federal agencies for fiscal years 1997-99.

The report found that in FY 1997, the seven agencies it reviewed participated in 575 international science and technology agreements with 57 countries, 8 international organizations, and 10 groups or organizations and/or countries. More than 90% of the international S&T agreements resulted in research projects or other research-related activities such as consultations among scientists and exchanges of data and personnel.

The report finds that during the 1990s, states increasingly have included an S&T component in their economic development plans, and between 1991 and 1995 no fewer than thirteen states adopted statewide S&T strategic plans of varying levels of sophistication and complexity.

Survey data on the various sectors of the U.S. economy including industry, government, academia, and selected nonprofits are aggregated within this report so that the components of the overall R&D effort are placed in a national context.

The report introduces the U.S. Corporate research and development (R&D) data series to provide new information and context on the R&D activity of the Nation’s top 500 R&D spending corporations. Data is based on the Standard and Poor’s Compustat database.

The report expands and updates the information contained in an earlier study based upon 1992 data. It examines a wide range of practical questions and policy concerns arising from the rapid growth of the
global R&D enterprise.

The report by the National Science Board provides informaion on S&T resources needed by policymakers, industry and academia in weighing policy options. New features include several reflections on futre pressures and possible trends coupled with the identification of a number of important data and information gaps.

According to the author, research and development collaboration is a means, not an end. Moreover, the dearth of systematic analysis and evaluation of existing federal policies toward collaboration hampers efforts to match the design of collaborative programs to the needs of different firms, industries, or sectors.